Composer Anne Boyd’s new orchestral work, inspired by Australia’s first desert botanic garden, will premiere at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music’s Chancellor’s concert at the end of March. Olive Pink’s Garden is inspired by the work of Olive Muriel Pink, the anthropologist, artist and Aboriginal-rights activist who founded the Olive Pink Botanic Garden in Alice Springs.

2017 is Boyd’s 27th year as a Professor at the University of Sydney – she was the university’s first female Professor of Music – and the end of the year will mark her retirement from fulltime academia.

^{Harpist Will Nichols running through his solo part in Anne Boyd’s Olive Pink’s Garden}

The work introduces ideas connected to Boyd’s forthcoming opera – part of a trilogy of works inspired by three Australian women, Daisy Bates, Olive Pink and Annie Lock. Each of the women worked closely with Aboriginal Australians and their lives were intertwined in significant ways. “The stories of these inspiring women show a path to cultural maturity through a two-way approach in telling Australian stories as opportunities connecting us culturally and spiritually with our fellow Indigenous Australians,” said Boyd.

Olive Pink’s Garden has additional significance for the composer, as it is one...